Playing in Brooklyn 'surreal' for Bulls' Gibson

Forward amazed that his old neighborhood is now home to an NBA team

Bulls power forward Taj Gibson is excited to play near where he grew up Friday night in Brooklyn, N.Y. (Chris Sweda/Tribune photo)

Taj Gibson can't believe it either.

On Friday night, the fourth-year Bulls forward will enter Barclays Center with his teammates, perhaps as the starting power forward if Carlos Boozer's sore right hamstring sidelines him again.

The sparkling new arena, home to the Brooklyn Nets, is right down the street from the Fort Greene housing projects where Gibson once lived and where he and his boyhood friends often played pickup basketball.

That both the Nets and Gibson have arrived at this point makes Gibson shake his head and smile.

"It's a crazy, surreal feeling," he said, sitting in front of his locker in the visitors' locker room at the Bradley Center late Wednesday in Milwaukee. "That area used to be dirty and griminess around there, drug dealers and gangs and stuff. Now it's clean. The area is beautiful. It has created a lot of jobs for Brooklyn."

With hard work and perseverance, Gibson created his job long ago. He attended three high schools, not including a brief stint in which he was home schooled, before landing at USC with then-coach Tim Floyd.

He even stopped playing basketball for a spell in high school to help support his family, working 12-hour days for a moving company.

Not all late first-round picks last in the NBA. But after signing a four-year, $33 million extension with incentives before this season, the 26th pick in the 2009 draft can look back at those 12-hour days of labor with nostalgia.

"Every journey to the NBA is different," Gibson said. "Mine is one of the long shots. To see I'm here and playing in my hometown city is crazy."

Gibson got off to an extremely slow start after signing that extension. But he's coming off a 14-point, nine-rebound effort in Milwaukee, his second start this season. And his averages of 8.8 points on 52.3 percent shooting and 5.7 rebounds in January made it his best month statistically.

In Gibson's other start, also in January, he had 21 points and 11 rebounds in Orlando in close to 45 minutes of a victory that Joakim Noah missed with the flu.

"Taj is really starting to play better," coach Tom Thibodeau said. "He's slowing down, not trying to do too much. And he's getting good post position. When he gets deep post position, he's so much more efficient."

Gibson said he usually gets roughly 20 tickets for family and friends when the Bulls play the Knicks at Madison Square Garden or the Nets at their previous home in East Rutherford, N.J. He said that number will swell Friday.

"If you had told me as a kid that I'd be playing in an NBA game right down the street from where I grew up, I would've said, 'Yeah, right,' " Gibson said. "Growing up in Brooklyn, you never saw NBA players. Now you've got the LeBrons and Carmelos playing on the big stage in Brooklyn. It's phenomenal."